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A country as wealthy as America should have a socialised health care system which is free at the point of service for everyone. That people are on waiting lists for life saving drugs is truly shameful.

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''Poor is the man whose pleasures depend on the permission of another.''

Well he fought for and got Obama care, amazing! It will help anyone with a serious health challenge. Let's hope it all comes on line by the end of his second term and he never ever caves on it, nor does the Congress.

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“From each, according to his ability; to each, according to his need” 1875 K Marx

He also got the National HIV/AIDS Strategy developed and it just celebrated its one year since development/implementation.

This and the Affordable Care Act are not small feats - especially while he has been dealing with two wars and a tanked economy that the previous president left him to handle -

Of course, for some people, nothing short of the President putting on a lab coat and announcing that he has discovered a cure for HIV will be sufficient.

While there still is much work to be done - given everything else which is competing for his attention (can we say, debt ceiling? Libya? Afghanistan? Unemployment? Iraq?) he hasn't sat idle and done nothing - and in a couple years in office has done more than some presidents did throughout their multiple terms. IJS

Maybe a better way to phrase all of this is "Why has Congress failed to address the AIDS crisis in America?" I can't help notice that most of the criticism is centered on global AIDS funds, when the real focus should be on fully funding the needs of AMERICANS WITH HIV and then worry about the rest of the world. Yes we can and should do both, but attacks like these make it seem like America is expected to treat the whole world, while ignoring her own citizens.

If you really want change, why don't you focus on promoting world AIDS funds, where every country pays their fair share, instead of insinuating that somehow our president is a failure regarding AIDS funding. If you bothered to look further, you will find that many of the problems with ADAP are a direct result of state policies that have been severely reduced under Republican administrations. Yes there are problems with combating AIDS, but there is more than enough blame to go around and so what.

What would be more helpful is posting ways or suggestions to address AIDS funding, rather than posting another cheap shot at President Obama.

The president also finished the work his predecessor started and finally got rid of the HIV travel ban. That was hugely important. I don't know why Bush waited until the very end of his presidency, or why Obama at first undid it and started the process over again from the beginning, (see here: http://blogs.poz.com/peter/archives/2009/05/obamas_silence_on_ai.html) thus essentially delaying it by another six or eight months or so. But the point is that the travel ban, that monstrosity, is finally gone.

By the way--it is interesting to read that editorial two years later: not only is the ban gone, but there is a health care plan!

Maybe I'm way off base... but considering the OP, I didn't even need to read the link (though I did) to know it would have a negatively biased slant. I guess the whole health care thing doesn't have any bearing on HIV.

Maybe I'm way off base... but considering the OP, I didn't even need to read the link (though I did) to know it would have a negatively biased slant. I guess the whole health care thing doesn't have any bearing on HIV.

The Obama administration announced Tuesday that it will support a congressional effort to repeal a federal law that defines marriage as a legal union between a man and woman.

White House spokesman Jay Carney denounced the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), saying the administration will back a bill introduced this year by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) to remove the law from the books.

Feinstein’s bill, called the Respect for Marriage Act, would “uphold the principle that the federal government should not deny gay and lesbian couples” the same rights as others, according to Carney.

The Senate is scheduled to hold an initial hearing on Feinstein’s proposal on Wednesday.

“The policy was wrong then and it is wrong today, and I believe it should be repealed,” Feinstein said Tuesday morning during remarks at the National Press Club.

Obama’s decision came five months after his administration instructed U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. to stop defending DOMA and represents a continuing evolution in Obama’s views on same-sex marriage. In February, Holder said parts of DOMA were unconstitutional because of “classifications based on sexual orientation.”

The issue has become politically dicey for Obama as he and his Republican rivals ramp up for the 2012 campaign season. The president was booed last month during an appearance in New York, when he told a gay audience that “traditionally marriage has been decided by the states.” Forty-one states currently ban same-sex marriage.

Opponents of same-sex marriage have decried the Justice Department’s refusal to defend the law as an unjustified political move.

Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, hailed Obama’s decision to back the congressional push.

“We thank the President for his support of the Respect of Marriage Act,” Solmonese said in a statement. “He has repeatedly expressed his desire to see the discriminatory Defense of Marriage Act repealed. … By supporting this legislation, the President continues to demonstrate his commitment to ending federal discrimination against tens of thousands of lawfully married same-sex couples.”